As I've mentioned before, I recently decided that our entire household would have to be gluten free after I was accidentally glutened several times by crumbs. My husband didn't really mind because I've been doing my best to come up with nice meals, including dinners with gluten free pasta and pizza, plus I've made bread and muffins, etc.
One thing we noticed was that Emma's eczema cleared up after just a few weeks on the diet. So she definitely has a gluten sensitivity, if not full blown celiac disease.
We had assumed all along that my husband had no problems with gluten until recently, when (during Superbowl Sunday and for a few days afterwards) he consumed some products containing gluten for the first time since we had gone gluten free. He ended up with a horrible skin condition/rash all over the place that the dermatologist has diagnosed as psoriasis. I've looked at pictures of psoriasis and pictures of dermatitis herpetiformis (aka DH) from the Internet and I think it looks more like DH. DH is associated with celiac disease, and if someone is diagnosed with DH, that automatically means that he or she also has celiac disease. There are a couple of spots that look like blisters had formed and popped....that would definitely indicate DH, not psoriasis.
But whether it's psoriasis or DH doesn't really matter, because the gluten-free diet is recommended for both.
This was an unexpected thing....really a big surprise to us, but I'm so glad we found out that he's gluten sensitive and/or celiac too, because undiagnosed celiac disease is very dangerous....it can lead to cancer.
So don't feel bad about putting your family members on the gluten free diet. It may even save them from medical problems in the future.
3 comments:
So glad you posted this! I have a similar skin reaction to gluten...little deep blisters that pop and then crack. Itchy, itchy itchy! And before I went GF I had been dx'd with psorisis (sp?) and a form of eczema...but I'm pretty sure it was dh. It cleared up completely on the gluten free diet and only returns if I've been glutened. My son's eczema cleared up on the gf diet, too! He'd had it since he was a toddler, now he only gets it when glutened (although dairy will sometimes flare it up too, now that I think about it). Thanks for supporting having the whole family on the gf diet, it's hard to do but it *is* healthier by and large and it's nice not to have to worry about getting crumbs dispersed in your dishwasher, toaster oven, etc.
It's really amazing how many people I'm meeting lately who also have problems with gluten.
I read somewhere that the latest research suggests that as much as 40% of the population may have some sort of gluten sensitivity and not know it.
It was hard at first to have everyone go gluten free, but we're doing pretty well now! Thank goodness the kids like Rice Chex! :)
Wow. I ought to try putting everyone on a gluten free diet. Right now they keep all gluten products in a portable island type cabinet at the end of the kitchen, away from where I cook and bake. Dinners are always gf though, and often breakfast too.
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